Forgotten English: March 18th - March 23rd
Monday's forgotten word:
Busman's holiday (noun) - Leisure time spent in occupations of the same nature as those in which one engages for a living. [Still heard in Britain.]
--Albert Hyamson's Dictionary of English Phrases, 1922
Step to the Rear, Please
On this date in 1662, the era of public transportation service began in Paris, with large six-horse carriages driven by two coachmen transporting eight passengers on a fixed route. But interest in this experimental convenience faded and ridership declined quickly. This early version of "Le Métro" was eventually abandoned and not rekindled until a century and a half later, in 1826 in Nantes, France - and more notably in 1829, when George Shillibeer introduced the forerunner of London's famous double-decker "omnibus." And New York followed suit in 1829.
Edwin Radford's Unusual Words and How They Came About (1946) wrote about the "busman's holiday," as recalled by an 1890s conductor: "Fifty years ago . . . the [bus]driver and his horses were as one; there was a deep attachment between them. When my driver has a day off, knowing that his horses would miss him, he always came to the terminus to see them off on the journey. If he suspected the temporary driver of not treating them well, he would travel throughout the journey as a passenger . . . and when we saw a driver riding on his bus during his day off we always said of him that he was 'taking a busman's holiday.'"
Tuesday's:
Biblioclast (noun) - A destroyer of books, or the Bible.
--Sir James Murray's New English Dictionary, 1888
Biblical Bloopers
On this date in 1517, the Church forbade the printing of any book - particularly the Bible - without permission. Since then, printings of the Bible have contained curious errors, among them a 1632 edition called the Wicked Bible which omitted not in the Seventh Commandment, leaving "Thou shalt commit adultery." A 1652 Cambridge Press undertaking, dubbed the Unrighteous Bible, posed the rhetorical question in 1 Corinthians 6:9, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall inherit the Kingdom of God?" The 1551 Bug Bible was so named after an erroneous translation of bogies to bugges in Psalm 91:5, yielding, "Thou shalt not be afraid of bugges by nighte." As late as 1833, Noah Webster published a "sanitized" Bible, replacing such libertine terms as "give suck" with "nourish." In Isaiah 24:9, the Beer Bible was created by the replacement of "strong drink" with "beer."
Perhaps the most noteworthy variant was one printed in 1579, which became known as the Breeches Bible because in Genesis 3:7 breeches was substituted for aprons in describing how Adam and Eve "sewed figge-tree leaves together and made themselves breeches." This passage contributed to the use of fig-leaf concealment in Western Art.
Wednesday's:
Toad-stone (noun) - (1) A popular name for bufonite, from the fact that it was formerly supposed to be a natural concretion found in the head of the common toad. Extraordinary virtues were attributed to it, [such as] protection against poison, and [it] was often set in rings. That this belief was rife in Shakespeare's day is proved by the lines [from] As You Like It, "Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head."
--Robert Hunter's Encyclopædic Dictionary, 1894
(2) You shall knowe whether the toad-stone be the right and perfect stone or not. Holde the stone before a toad so that he may see it, and if it be a right and true stone, the toad will leape towarde it and make as though he would snatch it. He envieth so much that man should have the stone.
--Thomas Lupton's A Thousand Notable Things, 1579
(3) Virginia-frog, a frog that is eight or ten times as big as any in England, and makes a noise like the bellowing of a bull.
--John Kersey's New English Dictionary, 1772
Feast Eve of St. Benedict,
an influential fifth- and sixth-century patron of poisoning victims.
Johnny Crapaud was once employed by Brits to demean a Frenchman, or to personify the French, just as John Bull refers to the English. Crapaud was an old French word for toad, which led to their current nickname, "frog."
Thursday's:
Evenlength (noun) - The time of year when the days and nights are of equal length; the equinox.
--Sir James Murray's New English Dictionary, 1897
Approval of Seal
Robert Forby's Vocabulary of East Anglia (1830) offered this alternate meaning for the noun seal: "Time; season. Hay-seal, wheat-seal, and barley-seal are the respective seasons of mowing or sowing those products of the earth. But it goes as low as hours. Of an idle and dissipated fellow we say that he 'keeps bad seals'; of poachers, that they are 'out at all seals of the night'; of a sober, regular, and industrious man, that he attends to his business 'at all seals,' or that he 'keeps good seals.' Sir Thomas Browne spells it sele, nearer to the Saxon sæl, opportunit[y]." Even as late as 1893, Eveline Camilla Gurdon's Suffolk County Folklore contributed this twist: "To give one the seal of the day, to be commonly civil to him, but nothing more."
Nicholas Breton's Fantasticks: Serving for a Perpetuall Prognostication (1626) wrote of the season which begins on this, the vernal equinox: "It is now Spring, a time blest of the heavens . . . The beasts of the woods look out into the plaines, and the fishes out of the deepe run up into the shallow waters, and the breeding fowles fall to building their nests."
Friday's:
Devil's bedstead (noun) - (1) The four of clubs, a card which is considered unlucky.
--Georgina Jackson's Shropshire Word-Book, 1879
(2) Opiniatrety, unreasonable attachment to one's own notions.
--Rev. John Boag's Imperial Lexicon of the English Language, c.1850
Birthday of Rev. Samuel Peters (1735-1826),
a Connecticut-born British loyalist. He collected the first list of early Puritan codes of behavior known as "blue laws," publishing them in his General History of Connecticut by a Gentleman of the Province. These forty-five morality-based rules helped him spice up his otherwise dry-as-toast historical tome. But their inclusion apparently was not enough to satisfy Monthly Review critics who panned his book, proclaiming, "We do not hesitate to pronounce it altogether unworthy of the public attention." Examples of blue laws include: "No one shall run on the Sabbath-day, or walk in his garden or elsewhere, except reverently to and from meeting. No one shall travel, cook victuals, make beds, sweep house, cut hair, or shave on the Sabbath-day . . . No one shall keep Christmas or Saints-days, make minced pies, dance, play cards, or play on any instrument of music - except the drum, trumpet, and jew's-harp." In addition, "A wife shall be deemed good evidence against her husband," and "Whoever brings cards or dice into the dominion shall pay £5."
Saturday's:
Marriage-music (noun) - (1) Children's cries.
--B.E.'s Dictionary of the Termes . . . of the Canting Crew, 1699
(2) Go after, to court; to go sweethearting. "Does John go after Mary?"
--G.F. Northall's Warwickshire Word-Book, 1896
Andew Waterman's Almanacks
of the 18th century considered the 23rd of March to be an excellent day for courtship and marriage.
Christina Hole's Traditions and Customs of Cheshire (1937) described a questionable practice known as "sitting-up" in Barthomley, which was deeply deplored by the clergy: "On Saturday nights, the courting couples met and spent the night together in the house or the outbuildings, which were left unlocked for them. All attempts to stop them were unsuccessful since farmers could not get any servants to come to them on hiring-days unless this privilege was allowed. The custom was by no means confined to Barthomley, but was found all over Cheshire and the counties bordering it. It probably did very little harm, and resembles somewhat a custom found in Finland. There the young man was admitted to the girl's room and was allowed to take off his boots and coat before lying down, but no more. The utmost censure would have been visited by public opinion on any young man who abused his privilege, and in fact few ever did."
All text © 2012 Jeffrey Kacirk